Loading More Content
The UK’s medical workforce faces a more complicated problem than simply having too few doctors. The NHS has recruited large numbers of doctors from overseas, whilst medical school numbers have increased. Due to this, many newly qualified doctors are now facing intense competition for the next stage of their careers, called postgraduate medical training.
There is no single number that tells us exactly how many doctors the UK ‘needs’. Workforce requirements depend on population growth, the age of the population, the demand for healthcare, and the number of doctors required in different specialties.
However, there are clear signs of pressure on the NHS workforce. In England, there were 7,248 medical staff vacancies in September 2025, representing a 4.4% vacancy rate amongst medical staff. Across the NHS workforce as a whole, there were more than 100,000 vacancies.
Temporary staff and locum doctors can fill these gaps, but this is one reason why the UK has increasingly relied on doctors who have been trained overseas.
An international medical graduate (IMG) is a doctor whose primary medical qualification was obtained outside of the UK.
International doctors have always played an important role in the NHS, but their contribution has grown a lot in recent years.
The General Medical Council (GMC) reported that there were 138,405 licensed doctors in the UK who qualified overseas in 2025. They represented around 42% of all licensed doctors. Likewise, more than two-thirds of doctors newly joining the UK medical register in the previous year had qualified outside the UK.
This is particularly important because training a doctor takes many years, and a doctor might spend five or six years at university, followed by two years of Foundation training, and then several more years completing specialty training.
Recruiting an already qualified doctor from overseas can help the NHS increase its workforce much more quickly, and the growth in IMG recruitment has become very noticeable in postgraduate training.
According to the GMC, the proportion of specialty training offers going to international graduates increased from 26% in 2018/19 to 34% in 2023/24.
The reasons behind this increase are complex: international doctors may have varying experience and different qualifications. Importantly, many IMGs are also already working in the NHS before applying for specialty training.
This has created a growing group of UK-trained doctors working in locally employed (LE) roles rather than formal training posts. These doctors can make an important contribution to day-to-day NHS services, but remaining outside a structured training programme for several years can make their career progression more difficult.
The number of doctors being offered postgraduate training places has increased considerably. Between 2013/14 and 2023/24, the number of doctors receiving offers for postgraduate medical training almost doubled, from 6,415 to 12,176.
However, the number of applicants has also increased, and in 2025, 15,723 UK-trained doctors and 25,257 overseas-trained doctors competed for 12,833 specialty training posts.
These figures highlight how competitive postgraduate training has become, showing that getting into medical school is not the end of the selection process, and selection remains rigorous throughout.
The pressure on training places has led to changes in postgraduate recruitment.
In 2026, the Medical Training Prioritisation Act changed the way applications for medical training in England are handled, giving priority to UK-trained doctors and certain doctors with significant NHS experience.
The impact was substantial, and NHS England reported that 33,953 applications reached the standard for 9,315 specialty training posts in 2026. Amongst the newly prioritised candidates, the competition ratio was around 2:1, compared with approximately 4:1 across all applications, decreasing competition greatly.
NHS England also reported that 98% of posts were filled by prioritised candidates, compared with 72% in 2025. In general practice (GP), 100% of accepted training places went to UK graduates or applicants working in the NHS, compared with 62% the year before.
The UK’s doctor shortage is not simply a question of how many doctors there are.
It is about whether the healthcare system can recruit enough doctors, train them effectively, retain them, and provide sufficient opportunities for them to progress.
A new medical school place today does not create a consultant tomorrow. An IMG recruited today may help fill an immediate staffing gap, but they may also need years of training before becoming a consultant or GP. Likewise, increasing the number of medical graduates without increasing postgraduate training capacity can simply move the bottleneck further along the system.
You can learn how to answer these in our free Interview Question Bank which has over 100 questions and answer guides.
Loading More Content